Understanding the Publi PDF Optimizer plug-in
Publi PDF Optimizer is a plug-in module for Publi PDF that implements on-the-go optimizations into the conversion process.
Publi PDF Optimizer is primarily targeting color and media issues related to press-ready PDF creation. Among other things you can convert any input Gray, RGB, CMYK or spot color to new CMYK or new spot colors of your choice, or any CMYK/spot/tint combination.
The features of Publi PDF Optimizer are in particular useful when you work with applications that rely on the Windows Operating System printer driver — an RGB device used to both display and print elements in RGB color space only. Among such applications are:
- Adobe FrameMaker, all known versions, Windows
- ArcView, all known versions
- AutoCAD (incl. the PS-Out filter)
- Crystal Reports, all known versions
- Older Corel VENTURA versions
- Corel WordPerfect Suite, all known versions
- Lotus SmartSuite, all known versions
- MapInfo, all known versions
- Microsoft Office, all known versions
- Microsoft Publisher, all known versions
- Microsoft Visio, all known versions
All these applications all are well known and widely used for different kinds of publishing. Most often printers complain about the inconvenience and expense of preparing such documents for commercial printing. However, by using the Publi PDF Optimizer plug-in you can supply press-ready PDF documents with very little difficulty.
Publi PDF Optimizer contain two modules:
- Color Optimizer pays special attention to the color problems described in
the
Difficult PDF documents in prepress white paper. Hence, Color Optimizer
cares for color analysis, color conversion and creation of Color Maps.
- Media Optimizer is an extension to Color Optimizer that cares for page cropping and marking issues such as setting trim marks, registration marks etc.
Enabling Media Optimizer will increase conversion time considerably. Media Optimizer should only be used when the front end applications cannot provide similar functionality, i.e. with typical Office-type applications.
The properties and methods for each module are described below.
Enumerations and objects
Enumerations
The following Optimizer related enumeration constants are available via the QueueMonDLL ActiveX object:
Each of these enumerations are explained below:
| Name | Value | Meaning |
|---|---|---|
| enocLeaveUnchanged | 0 | Don't make any conversion, i.e. pass on the original color space. |
| enocConvertToCMYK | 1 | Convert to DeviceCMYK. |
| enocConvertToGray | 2 | Convert to DeviceGray. |
The enOptimizerColorConversionConstants enumeration is subject to changes.
See: OptimizerRGBImageConversion.
Objects
Publi PDF Optimizer does not currently provide/document any public objects.
Parameters in the configuration file
Publi PDF Optimizer implements an additional set of parameters into the configuration file. From the DirColorTables entry in the [Configuration] group it determines where to find the Color Map file referred to by the OptimizerColorMap entry in each [<Queue Name>] group.
Important: The folder defined by DirColorTables must contain a file called »Default.ccMap«. Do not overwrite this file and remember to have it moved properly if you change the DirColorTables configuration entry to anything else than the default. If Publi PDF Optimizer cannot find the »Default.ccMap« file or it has been impaired by errors caused by manual changes, any queues using Publi PDF Optimizer may malfunction.
Publi PDF Optimizer implements the following queue based parameters:
Color Optimizer
- OptimizerAutomaticOverprint
- OptimizerAutoMergeSpotPlates
- OptimizerColorMap
- OptimizerCreateJobColorMap
- OptimizerDeleteGradients
- OptimizerDeleteImagemasks
- OptimizerDeleteImages
- OptimizerReportColorsToLog
- OptimizerRGBImageConversion
Media Optimizer
- OptimizerAutoExpandMedia
- OptimizerMediaPluginEnabled
- OptimizerRegMarksEnabled
- OptimizerTrimMarksEnabled
Color Optimizer and Media Optimizer (shared)
Publi PDF Optimizer implements a huge amount of other switches, but these are not yet documented. All switches will be published here as soon as possible.
| Type | Value | Meaning |
|---|---|---|
| Number (Boolean) |
0 (default) | The queue will set the PDF CropBox to the page size selected in the print dialog (the PDF TrimBox), i.e. the view in Acrobat will look as if the media size wasn't changed. |
| 1 | The queue will set the PDF CropBox to the expanded media size (the PDF MediaBox). |
Any version prior to 1.00.0227 did have OptimizerAutoExpandMedia=1 as default value.
| Type | Value | Meaning |
|---|---|---|
| Number (Boolean) |
0 | The queue will pass on PostScript Overprint as it's defined in the input PostScript stream rather than use Overprint settings from the Color Map file or automatic calculations. |
| 1 (default) | The queue will apply Overprint as defined in the Color Map file or
automatic calculations. Any setting from the input PostScript stream
will be ignored. If a color is automatically converted, any Process Black vector based object will have Overprint applied and any other object will have Overprint removed. |
Versions from 1.00.0227 or later have OptimizerAutomaticOverprint=1 as default value. Do not change this value unless when you know for sure that Overprint is properly set in the input PostScript stream.
| Type | Value | Meaning |
|---|---|---|
| Number (Boolean) |
0 | The queue will pass on spot color plates as they are defined in the input PostScript stream. |
| 1 (default) | The queue will automatically merge spot color plates when the names of the spot color plates indicate that it's reasonable to merge them into the same color plate. |
When OptimizerAutoMergeSpotPlates is enabled all extension names to e.g. Pantone colors such as CV, CVC and CVU, will be removed from the spot color name. Objects defined with the resulting same Pantone color will be moved to a separation plate with this name, i.e. »almost equal« spot color names will be merged into a single color plate.
For example, if the spot color names »Pantone 386 CV«, »Pantone 386 CVC« and »Pantone 386 CVU« appear in the same document the resulting merged color plate will be »Pantone 386«.
Spot colors in gradients may or may not merge.
| Type | Value | Meaning |
|---|---|---|
| String | File name without path and extension |
Points to the color map file that the Publi PDF Optimizer plug-in will
use upon conversion. The default value is »Default«, and a valid Default.ccMap file is required to be found in the folder specified by the DirColorTables configuration entry. |
If the Optimizer plug-in is not installed the value of OptimizerColorMap is ignored.
If the value points to a name that cannot be found in the folder specified by DirColorTables, Publi PDF will fall back and use Default.ccMap instead. If Default.ccMap is missing or has been impaired by errors caused by manual changes, any queues using the Optimizer plug-in may malfunction.
New color maps can be created with the Publi PDF PubliClient.exe application and should not be created manually unless a very skilled PostScript programmer person does it. Default.ccMap provide any required instructions as PostScript comments.
The value None is illegal for the OptimizerColorMap entry.
| Type | Value | Meaning |
|---|---|---|
| Number (Boolean) |
0 (default) | The queue will not create Color Maps for each job. |
| 1 | The queue will automatically display the Color Map for a job before it instantiate conversion. |
Setting OptimizerCreateJobColorMap=1 has effect only for Attended queues.
| Type | Value | Meaning |
|---|---|---|
| Number (Boolean) |
0 (default) | The queue will pass on all gradients to the output document. |
| 1 | The queue will automatically delete gradients defined as PostScript smooth shadings during conversion. |
Setting OptimizerDeleteGradients=1 might be useful when it's spot colored content only that has to be passed on to the output document, for example for adding a language plate to blanks in the press.
This function has effect only for gradients painted by the PostScript shfill operator. For information on this operator refer to the PostScript Language Reference Manual, 3rd edition.
| Type | Value | Meaning |
|---|---|---|
| Number (Boolean) |
0 (default) | The queue will pass on masked images to the output document. |
| 1 | The queue will automatically delete masked images during conversion. |
Setting OptimizerDeleteImagemasks=1 might be useful when it's spot colored content only that has to be passed on to the output document, for example for adding a language plate to blanks in the press.
This function has effect only for 1-bit images painted by the PostScript imagemask operator. For information on this operator refer to the PostScript Language Reference Manual, 3rd edition.
| Type | Value | Meaning |
|---|---|---|
| Number (Boolean) |
0 (default) | The queue will pass on images to the output document. |
| 1 | The queue will automatically delete images during conversion. |
Setting OptimizerDeleteImages=1 might be useful when it's spot colored content only that has to be passed on to the output document, for example for adding a language plate to blanks in the press.
This function has effect only for 1-bit images painted by the PostScript image and colorimage operators. For information on these operators refer to the PostScript Language Reference Manual, 3rd edition.
| Type | Value | Meaning |
|---|---|---|
| Number (Boolean) |
0 | Effectively disables the Publi PDF Optimizer plug-in, i.e. both the Color Optimizer and Media Optimizer is disabled. |
| 1 (default) | Enables the Publi PDF Optimizer Plug-in. |
OptimizerEnabled can be changed without affecting other settings in Optimizer. However, other Optimizer settings has no effect at all when OptimizerEnabled=0.
Setting OptimizerEnabled=1 does not automatically enable the Media Optimizer. The enabled state of Media Optimizer is determined by OptimizerMediaPluginEnabled.
| Type | Value | Meaning |
|---|---|---|
| Number (Boolean) |
0 (default) | Displays the Color Optimizer and Media Optimizer plug-in User Interfaces in menus and dialogs. |
| 1 | Effectively hides User Interface parts related to the Optimizer plug-ins. |
Enabling OptimizerHideUI does not change the behavior of the Optimizer plug-ins. It simply prevent the user from making changes via the User Interface.
| Type | Value | Meaning |
|---|---|---|
| Number (Boolean) |
0 (default) | Disables the Media Optimizer part of the Publi PDF Optimizer plug-in, i.e. the Color Optimizer is not affected. |
| 1 | Enables the Media Optimizer part of the Publi PDF Optimizer plug-in. |
OptimizerMediaPluginEnabled can be changed without affecting other settings in Media Optimizer. However, other Media Optimizer settings has no effect at all when OptimizerMediaPluginEnabled=0.
Setting OptimizerMediaPluginEnabled=1 has no effect unless OptimizerEnabled=1.
| Type | Value | Meaning |
|---|---|---|
| Number (Boolean) |
0 | Disables insertion of registration marks. |
| 1 (default) | Enables automatic insertion of registration marks (also known as cross hairs) outside the defined page size. |
OptimizerRegMarksEnabled=1 has effect only when OptimizerMediaPluginEnabled=1.
| Type | Value | Meaning |
|---|---|---|
| Number (Boolean) |
0 (default) | The queue will not write any color conversion status to the .LOG file for each job. |
| 1 | The queue will report color conversion results to the job .LOG file. |
Setting OptimizerReportColorsToLog=1 will force Publi PDF Optimizer to write out all found color compositions to the .LOG file, and for each state whether or not the composition was found in the Color Map defined by OptimizerColorMap.
This feature is very useful when the .LOG file created for each job can be post-processed for validation purposes, for example to detect which colors that were automatically converted.
| Type | Value | Meaning |
|---|---|---|
| Number | Enumeration | Specifies how the queue will convert RGB images. |
The value of OptimizerRGBImageConversion is a numeric parameter representing one of the members of the enOptimizerColorConversionConstants enumeration. The default value is enocLeaveUnchanged, i.e. OptimizerRGBImageConversion=0.
Although Publi PDF Optimizer directly supports image RGB -> CMYK conversions (OptimizerRGBImageConversion=1) and RGB -> Gray conversions (OptimizerRGBImageConversion=2), it is generally not recommended to let Publi PDF Optimizer perform image conversion. If you have other options, e.g. if you are using Adobe Acrobat Distiller 7.0 or later with Publi PDF, you should definitely use such an option. Several reasons apply, but two are of special interest for automated work flows:
- Speed. Publi PDF Optimizer performs image conversion via PostScript – but PostScript is not geared very well for that. Setting OptimizerRGBImageConversion to anything else than enocLeaveUnchanged (i.e. 0) will dramatically increase conversion time.
- Quality. Image conversion is better handled either before or after Publi PDF Optimizer.
If you use Acrobat Distiller 7.0 or later as JobInterpreter for a queue you can set-up image RGB -> CMYK conversion in the Distiller .joboptions file pointed to by AcroHighResSettingsFile. Doing so will provide exceptionally fast and precise CMYK image conversion according to ICC profiles after Publi PDF Optimizer has converted vector-based art.
| Type | Value | Meaning |
|---|---|---|
| Number (Boolean) |
0 | Disables insertion of trim marks. |
| 1 (default) | Enables automatic insertion of trim marks (also known as cut marks) outside the defined page size. |
OptimizerTrimMarksEnabled=1 has effect only when OptimizerMediaPluginEnabled=1.
Known problems
The Publi PDF Optimizer plug-in may conflict with some start-up plug-ins for Adobe Acrobat Distiller, such as some versions of the Creo Distiller Assistant.
Last revised: 19-12-2007.